Theatre Design & Technology - Winter 2010 - 78

technicAl PrOductiOn
Tech Expo 1987: Remotely operated air-lift castors; Douglas Tech Expo 1997: Ma and Pa Ubu costumes from found
C. Taylor, Unversity of Missouri, Kansas City.
objects; Teri Tavares, San Diego State University.

education, and the Presentation commission became artistic liaison. still
no technical Production commission-but one that sounds very similar, and it attracted the technical segment of the usitt membership. the
technical information commission was essentially a spin-off of the engineering, administration, and Presentation commissions. the first commissioner for technical information was allan bailey (Kansas state university)
and the commission's first major project under the direction of Jay glerum
was the "technical information filing system" which was inherited from the
engineering commission.
in addition to inherited projects, the technical information commission quickly made its mark with projects and programming. it appears that
the "new Products showcase" originated out of the technical information
commission programming with a session at the 1977 conference in Washington dc which was called "new Products and techniques for theatre."
the 1978 conference in Phoenix listed the session "new Products demonstration." finally in 1979 at the seattle conference, the big thursday night
all-conference session was listed as "new Products showcase." also at the
seattle conference, vice commissioner Harvey sweet and steve Zapytowski
started a new project for graphic standards which was cosponsored by the
education commission. that same year Harvey sweet began writing a column for the newsletter entitled "technician's tricks" and Jared saltzman
started another new column entitle "specialized Materials and Where to
find them." both of these columns continued in the newsletter over the
next couple of years. this new commission had quickly found its voice. .

Getting the name right.
about every five years or so the leadership of the usitt likes to reexamine and tinker with its structure, it's by-laws, etc. it was the commission
structure that once again underwent transformation at the 1981 cleveland
conference in order to attract and involve more of the membership. the
scenography commission was restructured into three interest groups: scenic design, lighting and sound design, and the already strong costume
design and technology, all three of which were tied together by the newly
created scenography liaison. the second big change was the renaming of
the technical information commission to the technical Production commission. as stated in the commissioners' report from the summer 1981
newsletter, "the technical information commission has been replaced and
expanded to form the new technical Production commission, designed to
serve the needs and projects of the technical director, stage Manager, Production Manager, stage Hand, carpenter, electrician, and shop foreman.
the new commission will address the organization, coordination, communication, and techniques of the technical team." the new name more directly addressed the identity of its constituent members, and besides, some

theatre

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teChnology

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Tech Expo 2009: A split-hook for Captain Hook; Gregory
Bell, Otterbein College.

thought the term "information" sounded more like a library commission. at
the same time as the name change, allan bailey stepped down as the commissioner after having served as the technical information commissioner
since its inception in 1976. Max devolder took the reigns as the first commissioner of the new technical Production commission.

A jewel in the making.
the next few years of commission activity centered mostly on conference
sessions with an eye to developing some of those sessions into projects of
the commission. tom corbett took over as technical Production commissioner in 1983 prior to the corpus christi conference. in his conference report about the commission's activities during the corpus christi conference,
tom corbett made mention of a tech faire-a modest "technical solutions"
faire. unfortunately the display (think exhibit) was away from the high traffic
areas and required a lot of time expenditure on the part of exhibitors who
spent several days answering questions. While the results were somewhat
disappointing, those that did find the out-of-the-way display were able to
share a lot in terms of technical information and ideas. the idea was seen as
valuable, but somehow it had not yet found the right format. they planned to
do a session on technical solutions at the next conference in orlando rather
than a manned exhibition to see if that format worked better. tom corbett's
tenure as commissioner ended prior to the orlando conference and he was
succeeded by Jay glerum. in his report about the commission's activities
at the orlando conference, Jay said, "the subjects ranged from hands-on
experience in a variety of technical problems to ..." clearly the session on
technical problems and solutions was at the very least a popular session, if
not a big hit. by the next conference in new York the topic had elevated to
project status as evidenced by Jay's report in the summer 1985 newsletter.
Jay reported that the technical Production commission's current projects
included a Directory of Technical Information, a Directory of Technical
Resource People, and one simply called Technical Solutions. the aim of
the latter project was to provide a forum in which tds could seek out and/
or provide solutions to specific technical problems. it is not much of a leap
to see that all three projects were aimed at a common goal: to share technical expertise, ideas, information and solutions to problems with each other
and with the broader membership of usitt.
Just prior to the 1986 conference in oakland Jay glerum moved up to
the board of directors which left a vacancy for the office of commissioner
for technical Production. during the conference, bob scales and rick stephens were appointed co-commissioners. one really noteworthy session of
the oakland conference was the very first tech olympics which was cosponsored by the technical Production commission in support of the student liaison and several student chapters. rick stephens must have been in charge

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